To Darkness, and Back
by PurpleAsteroid
Summary: "It was an endless dark tunnel; the dark consumed everything, it was tangible and real, threatening to swallow her up and leave her helpless sister to fend for herself in a world where trust, loyalty, and hope was nonexistent." [Reader x *character of choice*]


******Depressed!Reader x _**

**((A/N: This story has no particular pairing. You are free to pair yourself to whatever character you want~))**

Her world was the bleak, smog-filled city; dark and dangerous and threatening. Wherein you never knew what hid behind the shadowed alleys and old, abandoned buildings.

It was where the stars never shown, where there was no rainbow after the storm. Any remnants of memories of fairy tales-when they all sat down on her bed wrapped in her mother's warm blanket, and they would watch as their parents wove stories so real, so happy and full of hope, that even _she _believed-those were nothing more than spoken words by now.

To her, there was, and will never be, such a thing as magic, a prince charming, a fairy godmother, or faith.

She had drilled that into the very core of her mind as she looked down on the gravestones, side by side. The sky was grayer that day. Everything was black and white and gray and a meaningless blur. Her own sobs went unheard to her. She refused to listen to anything.

And even back then, with them, the world was dangerous.

The protective web spun with illusions of stories and promises of a better life was simply abruptly torn away, revealing the horrible reality. Everything depended on her now. Protecting herself, trying to earn a decent living, struggling to keep herself in the pathetic, graffiti-scarred place called a school.

She hated everything.

It was an endless dark tunnel; the dark consumed everything, it was tangible and real, threatening to swallow her up and leave her helpless sister to fend for herself in a world where trust, loyalty, and hope was nonexistent.

And then he came along.

Bright, happy, radiant as the sun that had never penetrated the thick smoke that hung in the atmosphere of the city. A smile that illuminated everything when the day was dark, chasing away the loneliness and depression that weighed her down for as long as she could remember.

At first he seemed like an illusion. A dream, something that would waver and fade if touched. And she was deathly scared of that, scared of going back to the cold, rigid darkness where there was nothing but her and a feeling of empty nothingness. She would tell herself to stop it, stop noticing him, anything.

But sometimes he made her forget. Sometimes she felt like there was no darkness, there was no cold. She was not alone anymore. He taught her how to smile again; easily melting down the icy barrier she had built between her and the rest of the world. He turned her to the brighter side, the one she, out of her despair and grief, did not allow herself too see. But now she did.

Maybe she didn't care anymore about the nonexistent stars and the permanently dull gray sky. Maybe it wasn't gray anymore. Somehow he had given everything color, blues and yellows and reds and greens that were always there, but she never really saw. There was more happiness in a day now than a year before.

_"Are you happy?"_

_There was a pause. And she smiled, a real smile. "Very."_

They could block out the noise of the world outside, block out the dirty air that contaminated everything, all the chaos and danger and every little thing she had worried about in the past-she didn't care anymore. The once unbreakable barrier was long gone.

But then the colorful stained-glass window she had now viewed everything from had shattered altogether. The shards dug into her skin, cutting and leaving stinging wounds. And again, the color was drained, faster than water being seeped into dry, greedy earth.

_"I have to go."_

Immediately, it crept up, that feeling she thought she would never feel again. This time it was colder, numbing her body and mind while a searing hot pain blinded her. She knew it would happen anyways. She knew he couldn't stay forever. That would be wishful thinking, hoping for the impossible.

So, again, why did she let him get to her? Why did she let herself hope, again, when she knew she would go back again? The emptiness swallowed her whole, leaving her blind and deaf and...nothing. The tunnel closed again, the bright light that was him was, once again, had faded.

Like every promise and dream she had ever dared cling to.


End file.
